Aging With Grace

Aging With Grace was founded by Nancy Glover as the evolution of expertise she has garnished since 2009 when she became the caregiver of her own elderly parents. Her in-depth understanding of all issues related to parental aging and care support provides a rich expertise that only an adult child turned parental caregiver can provide. She can identify where a caregiver may be struggling with their lack of accessing resources to support the desired outcomes for quality of care of an aging parent or spouse. Frustrated by the seeming lack of a coordinated and supportive process to help family members cope with the shifting dynamics that play out with the role reversal that takes place, Nancy also puts special emphasis on the importance of self care for caregivers. This is often lost within the government maze of red tape or under addressed with limited resources due to lack of funding for programs created to meet these challenges. Nancy has developed an organized system of answering and accessing key pieces of vital information to make the whole experience respectful for families involved in the transformation of roles from adult children to parental or spousal caretakers.

While the belief may be held that this issue is a matter of our current healthcare system, the truth is the growing number of family members having to become caregivers and advocates for their parents’ or spouses' well being is increasing rapidly. With limited resources available by community organizations and a lack of caseworkers able to address the increasing demands of our current aging population, getting the right information when it comes to helping empower and direct adult children caregivers is not happening efficiently. Those thrust into this position as caregivers are quickly finding themselves lost among the medical, legal and financial systems they rely on, and find themselves in overwhelm within their personal lives from the added responsibility. Life can unexpectedly change due to health issues, quality of living, or financial demands of parental needs, leaving adult children having to scramble to deal with the fallout of unprepared arrangements for the care of their parents and discovering little support for them as caregivers is available. For many adult children caregivers the first thing that slips, in most cases, are boundaries around their personal self care and their own lives as they get swept up with the immediate needs of their parent(s). Understanding how to reprioritize needs based on critical and necessary information and systems to support family caregivers and their parent or spouse is exclusively the goal of Aging With Grace. Taking control back over their lives while providing a solid workable plan for the continued care of their elderly loved ones is the whole reason Aging With Grace was founded. It's "Healthy Aging At Home" philosophy first addresses the more critical areas of legal, financial, medical, home care and caregiver support. Equally important longer-term planning focuses on other areas of that include personal and home safety, nutrition and fitness, community interaction and family involvement.

Creating a family plan while parents and adult children are able to address important issues before something happens is ideal. Understanding desired wishes and having the necessary legal and medical documentation such as a power of attorney, representative agreement, will and estate planning, and advance healthcare plans in place, creates a structure that not only provides the authority from which more choices are legally available, but also eliminates guessing what to do when the time comes to support the needs of each family member. Our lives change, the things that are important shift and our basic needs evolve during these situations. Through it's "Healthy Aging at Home" program, Aging With Grace can help create a Caregiver Action Plan that benefits all family member caregivers with the value of an agreed upon support structure and process, and which includes a higher level of self care that helps them experience greater confidence knowing they are attending their own needs while looking after the people who matter the most. The Caregiver Action Plan looks after various areas that are essential to the care and well being of aging parents by providing a step by step system that creates a place to keep and easily manage important information obtained through the resources and materials it lays out for families.

Our primary focus when working with a family caregiver is to empower their ability to become an advocate for their elderly parent or spouse when or if the time comes to do so. Making it clear that each family and its members have concerns over their loved ones' well being, creating a Family Caregiver Action plan with the help of Aging With Grace will take the stress out of what can be a difficult later life-stage transition. Having the benefit of what an elderly loved one clearly wants, and developing a plan to meet their needs and wishes while respecting those of the caregiver, will create better support and outcomes for the family overall. We are committed to enhancing the need of supported self care, aligned action, and personal empowerment for both the care receiver and caregiver alike. We feel that without this awareness, overwhelm can quickly set in often mixed with resentment when really it should be a time of increased care, support and respect in this later phase of life.